AAA, Day 2, pt 1: Chocolates are cheaper than water here!!!

When it comes to hotels, I'm big on complimentary breakfasts.

I always check what time they're on, and no matter how late I sleep, I always wake up for those. Always.

It's a fucking event on its own!

Anyways, I wake up far too early, 4ish, cursing as I do so. Obviously my body clock hasn't adjusted yet. I use the Force to fall back asleep, then wake up at 6. Damn it, still 1 1/2 hour more. Unfortunately the Force doesn't like being misused for such trivial matters, and thus, I am unable to sleep any further. Curses to the power of 16.

Turn on the TV instead. If you're a UK resident, then the morning shows are fine, coz you prob only catch a bit before heading of to do whatever you normally do. If you're a tourist, the morning shows can be darn annoying. After every half hour, they pretty much rehash everything from the previous half hour, albeit with updates. Apparently for 3 Hrs. I almost throw my last piece of Yorke at the damn box after the 3rd iteration. Fortunately, I put the throwing on the stack, and eat the choc in response. Everything resolves, choc is eaten, throwing fizzles, and damn box survives.

My cousin wakes around 7 and we get ready. At 7:30am I call our fellow travellers (yes, I CAN be anal about these things). Ronnie picks up, and I'm a bit surprised (thought he got lucky). Hawa in the background proceeds to yell, "He's not a virgin anymore!!!" My response, "Wasn't this news at least TEN years ago???" (He's 30, btw). Anyways, I ask if they wanna get breakfast. Ronnie says, "give us five minutes". Or ten. Can't remember but it felt like an eternity.

Complimentary breakfast turned out to be limited to toast and cereal, with a choice of juices and hot drinks. A complete English breakfast would cost extra, 7 pound 50 to be precise. Hey, if our sponsor isn't paying for it, I sure as hell ain't. Having said that, the toast tasted fantastic. We all had a lot, even though I had finished last night's Kebab a half hour ago!

Me and Hafiz went off to find a Cybercafe. Took us twenty minutes to find one open, and I stopped for a touristy pic with a double decker (hey, it's England). Updated my football team (yes, priorities).



Once back at the hotel, Ronnie announced that Tracy was coming along with us, and we'd detour to her hotel. Unsurprisingly Ronnie get us lost for awhile before finding it. (Apparently he took a cab the prior night). Tracy turned out to be quite a friendly person, and rather attractive too.

So we set off to Bayswater...

Shit, I haven't even made it past the morning yet, my entries are getting longer...

Tbc...

AAA, Part 3: The flight + 1st day

I forgot to mention in my previous post about the airflight baggage regulations. I pretty much stuffed everything into my main luggage coz I couldn't be bothered with any hand luggage issues. Ronnie however, decided to take his bag in as hand luggage. As a result, at the check-in, he had to reveal its entire contents to the counter-girl. Yeap, he was a bit embarassed, but hey, no pain no gain!

Anyway, 13hrs sitting on a flight is no joke, but fortunately there was a slew of movies for us to watch, especially good for me as I don’t sleep very well on planes. There was one questionable selection though, Hawa pointed out to me, as they were showing The Terminal as well. If you’ve watched that before, you’d know it’s not something you’d want to watch on an airplane to LONDON at this point in time! I did feel bad for Hawa though, her lengthy frame just did not fit the seats, making it a bit hard for her to get comfortable.

The flight wasn't very comfortable either, with quite a bit of turbulence. Hawa, who wasn't happy with the pilots, got their names down so that she'd know if she was flying with them again. Ronnie, on the other hand, was busy picking up one of the stewardesses, apparently doing well! The meals, although nothing special, were okay though.

We arrived safely early evening. We had the typical "which line do we go to?" immigration problem. Then Hafiz made an infamous comment, "Kita ni kat Heathrow ke Hydarabad???" (Are we in Heathrow or Hydrarabad?) We asked him why, and he said, take a look at the immigration counters. It appeared that all, yes ALL, the personnel manning the counters appeared to be of Indian descent!!!

Anyway, we made our way past the immigration without much problems, although she did ask us extensively about what we were doing here. We found our contact, and headed off to the parking lot for our taxivan. The weather felt like Genting!

Our hotel was the Kensington International, where the rooms were small, but golly gosh cozy. I did a bit of early exploring of the environs with Hafiz, and typically I ended up with chocolates (ha ha!) + Walker's Crisps. I bought a choc bar called YORKE, which had the tagline "NOT FOR GIRLS". I assume it was due to the heavy choc content, hey if I, of all people, can't finish a choc bar, I'd say it's an achievement for them choc-makers...

Then it was a bed flop, tv switch as we waited for dinner. Soon Hawa gave us a ring, and surprisingly she was alone. Turns out Ronnie went off with his stewardess (!)(Tracy, btw) and just passed her dough for dinner. We ended up exploring some more, looked for stuff in TESCO about 15 mins walk away, (where we were flummoxed trying to comprehend the pre-paid phone system), and finally settled on a Take-Away Kebab shop close to our hotel. The supposedly ‘small’ Doner Kebab turned out to be massive, and I ended up keeping half for next morning! I watched a bit of TV (nothing INTERESTING!!!) before retiring to bed.

To be continued...

Azmin's Awesome Adventure Pt 2

As I was part of the committee for my Company’s Staff Day that weekend, I had no time to actually think a lot about what I had won. The Staff Day itself had lots of interesting occurrences keeping my mind occupied.
The reality hit me on Monday, when I was back at work and Hawa from Fly FM called me up asking for names, ICs and passports. I panicked, because I actually thought the trip was in October! Turns out it was in two weeks time, i.e. August 17th-21st, and for me, Monday was a scramble to find a person to go with me who had a valid passport. I managed to narrow it down to Michelle, Ben and my cousin Ayu. In the latter half of the day I added my other cousin Hafiz (my mum thought it'd be a nice last bachelor trip), and in the end, he became my fellow traveler.
During the period that passed, I was informed by Hawa that we would receive our flight tickets on the day of departure itself. Typically, some of my family actually had misgivings that I had won, as there seemed to be NO real evidence around! (they never did catch any of those announcements on Fly FM about me winning...) As a result, the drive to the airport that Thursday morning had an air of doubt throughout.
Fortunately, all doubts were dispelled as we met Hawa and the Universal rep, Ronnie Gan at the airport, and received our tickets! It was indeed a reality! After saying goodbye to our respective folks, we headed over to Fly FM to chill before our flight. Yeap, the station’s in KLIA, for those who don’t know, hidden in terminal C5. The station's design was awesome though, it certainly made us wish we worked there! We got to see the DJs in action, and FlyGuy and Ben managed to squeeze in an interview with me and Hafiz. Was a bit nervous, but it was fun doing it! Oh, and DJ Nina was pretty darn cute too! We also had an insight into Hawa's work ethic, as she pretty much worked all the way till the final 30 minutes before our flight!!

With Rosyan, DJ Nina and Wan

Azmin the Sound Engineer





READY TO FLY!!!!

To be continued....

I think I've got into a bit of a rut...

... I think I need to reinvent myself. There are lots of things I feel I need to do, but haven't gotten it done. A change in appearance and outlook looks to be on the horizon...

This blog's appearance needs an uplift too...

Let's see what happens this month aighhhhht....

EPL YFF is back!!!

Unfortunately, I'm not.... at least quality-wise...

After 2 weeks, I'm looking like a pale shadow of the guy who finished 2nd place in the WGS league last season. At TT, I'm currently losing horribly in my WC group, (again, unlike last year where I pretty much strolled into the last 16). It's international break now though, which gives me a chance to regroup (currently in 9th position).

Transfer deadline has just passed, and crikey, the YFF world just got more complicated. The striker positions alone have got new choices like TEVEZ, Kuyt and Anelka! With such quality players at such cheap prices, it gets harder and harder to build the best squad. On the other side, I'm glad players like Reyes got kicked out of the EPL. I will never forget his rolling-onto-the-pitch incident....!

Of course, if lotsa players suddenly kop injuries during the internationals, it WOULD make things a lot easier... starting with Shevchenko and Ballack ha ha... okay, that's just me being cruel...

Here's my team as it stands (pre-transfer deadline effects):

Henry, Saha, Shevchenko, Ballack, Bullard, Rosicky, Fabregas, Aurelio, Shorey, Scharner, Jaaskelainen.

Yeah, I managed to squeeze Henry in. Amazing.

Saha currently looks long-term, as is Bullard. Yes, I've dropped last year's policy of having Stevie G a permanent fixture, because there's so much quality in the squad which reduces Steven Gerrard's necessity to be a one-man squad. I'm sticking with my no-Everton policy though, sorry ha ha...

Jaaskelainen at the Reebok against Watford appears to be the best chance of a CS. Scharner's there coz he's a midfielder listed in defence + he tries to score goals (it's a risk, coz he's almost a card magnet).

Yes, I'm expecting Arsenal to thrash Boro. No, Middlesbrough acquiring Woodgate doesn't change things much either. I CAN see myself replacing Shevchenko with either of those 3 strikers i mentioned earlier. Reason being Chelsea won't be THAT great coming off the internationals, so I won't put too much in them.

Finally, Aurelio could get replaced by Ashley Cole ceteris paribus. Yes, I feel sorry for Bridge, but somehow it keeps falling down...

Well, that's it for now. We'll see what happens after the Internationals aiight...

Azmin's Awesome Adventure Part 1!

It was a dream come true to win 2 FREE all-expense paid tickets to UK to watch ORSON, a rising force in the entertainment industry, at the madness of V Festival, England’s amazing music festivals. Well, not really a dream, cause I never really dreamt about it. I did fantasize though. A fair bit. Umm... won't go that route...

You see, I was lucky enough to be the eighth caller through on that fateful Thursday! At the time, I was driving back from Port Dickson, heading back to my office. I was part of the organizing committee (read: labour) and had just transported a load of hampers/prizes from office to PD and was making a 2nd trip. Tuning in to Fly FM, Shel, the active Fly FM DJ sounded the cue to call to participate in ORSON’S AWESOME ADVENTURE to win an Orson CD AND… the chance to win the all-expense paid tickets. As luck would have it, I got through! The question was: “What would you do if you found out there was ‘No Tomorrow’? My answer was simple: “I’d pack my bags immediately, pick a direction, and start walking. And walking. And walking. And see where I end up at the end of the day.” Shel replied, "Let me see, from PD if you went North, only SUNGAI BULOH lah!!!" I laughed,"Hey, that's good enough!"

Still, it was good enough to win the CD that day, and I went in the running for the trip prize which would be announced the next day. Friday came, and I was pretty busy, cause 100+ staff were coming in from all over Malaysia for the Staff Weekend, and I had a ton of stuff to do. At 4pm+ , as the staff began to arrive, I got a call from Fly Fm. It wasn't THE CALL, but rather a call to check if I was eligible for the Grand Prize, e.g. had a valid passport, Malaysian, etc. I was then told to listen later to find out whether I had won.

Of course, I was not able to listen, not having a portable radio with me as I was busy assisting with staff registration for the event. More specifically, I was in a room giving out respective showbags to my committee outside to give to each participant. The showbags were customised for each person due to the fact that the free t-shirts inside were taylored to each person's size specifications. However, the reception in the room was not that clear, so I decided to pass the phone to my fellow committee members outside to make sure any call could go through.

Suddenly my phone rang. Then for some reason one of my fellow committee (who shall not be named) decided to play hide and seek with my phone. Needless to say, I was pretty pissed off. Luckily she passed it back to me in time, else I swear I'dve torn her head straight off her shoulders! I picked up the call and it was Shel!!!! AND I WON!!!! I pretty much jumped around in joy, oblivious to everyone else.

Then Shel, who knew I was at my Company Event from yesterday's conversation, made me yell out to my fellow staff telling them I’d won a trip to UK from Fly FM, which I proceeded to do. A bit embarassing, but at that point, I DIDN’T CARE AT ALL!!!

I'd be heading to UK in OCTOBER !!!! (at least, I thought it was October...)

to be continued....

Quick update

Arrived in London, last night, flight was bad, quite a lot of turbulence, staying at Kensington International. Rooms are a bit small, but quite comfy otherwise...

Was too tired to explore last night, so just had a quick Kebab takeaway dinner which lasted till Breakfast TODAY!

We'll see what happens today...
Later....

QUICK UPDATES!!!

Yes, it's been a while. AGAIN. A MONTH.

So many things have happened since the last time I blogged.

Let's see:

1. Audit is pretty much finalised. Interesting experience now that I can see the perspective from the other side. A bit sad that I wouldn't be seeing the hottie ones anymore though...

2. Company Staff Day! Some amazingly good things happened and some NOT so amazing stuff discovered. The upshot of being a committee member for this is I finally got to establish a decent relationship with some of my fellow staff, after having been pretty much an alien since I joined in January. Still, if you notice, I seldom talk much in my blog about the people in my company, except maybe when it comes to ogling beauties, and I don't think that's about to change....
Lucky draw I only got some enamel bowl, but I shouldn't complain TOO much, considering the staff day also coincided with...

3. ME WINNING A TRIP TO UK FROM FLY FM!!!! Yes folks, it IS possible to win something fantastic from all those radio call-in competitions! I'm jetting off on a 5 day trip to London to attend the annual V festival concert! I'll be going off with my cousin, a FLY FM rep and a Universal Records rep. Was trying to get my daughter to go with me, but external forces intervened... :( Ah well...

4. Last weekend my team came in 5th at a Putrajaya treasure hunt, despite all odds. With 90+ teams in total, it was something of an achievement especially with all the pre-treasure hunt hassle. At the heart of the complaining, of course, was me. I'm just glad those stickers came off my car easily, or there'd be HELL to pay...

5. Finally, I read some not so good news today about a dear school friend of mine. Hope you recover quickly, and remember, despite what you may feel, it's NOT the end of the world

So tomorrow, all goes well, I'll be flying off! Will blog extensively on my trip (to be supplemented by pics)

p.s: Now, hopefully, the Fly Fm girl who's going with us is a hottie too...!

The male ego

Despite all the supposed 'advancements' in today's thinking, it's always a glowing feeling for a guy to be available for a 'damsel in distress'. Does wonders for the ego I tell ya!

Sometimes it's not even necessary to do much. Sometimes all you need do is be there, for example, to lend an ear for the poor troubled gal... If you're the soothing factor for previously boiling temperatures, the ensuing gratitude is all that you need to fuel your day.

Oh wow, what a coincidence... Excuse me, subject in question just walked in... later folks...

KWW!!!

After a hectic one month of desperate accounting, the auditors are finally here for the final audit.
Hopefully everything goes well...

Unfortunately, accounts closing has meant that I've been unable to catch as many World Cup matches as I wanted. I didn't even catch the Finals last weekend (my tired arse just couldn't cope)... I DID watch the extra-time replay yesterday (complete with head-butt incident).

There have been a number of interesting incidents though.. some of it due to my working late, some of it due to the WC. Too bad I don't have time to go through them, hope to make up for that in the coming entries.

Ticket 2 Ride has replaced Chess as my "game to play when I can't be pissed doing anything". Thanks to Loco who found it! Meanwhile, Fiezan, Triona, Ben and Dawn jumped on the bandwagon, er, train wagon..
Btw, I wanna try to have at least 3 entries a week. They may be short, but at least I'm writing something...

Finally, what's tall, eye-catching and occasionally causes shortness of breath?